"
Then sponging a jet of blood which spurted out from under his knife, he
added,--
"However, you shall have a few minutes rest now. My eyes and my hand are
exhausted. I see I am no longer young."
Dr. Seignebos was sixty years old. He was a small, thin man, with a bald
head and a bilious complexion, carelessly dressed, and spending his life
in taking off, wiping, and putting back again his large gold spectacles.
His reputation was widespread; and they told of wonderful cures which
he had accomplished. Still he had not many friends. The common people
disliked his bitterness; the peasants, his strictness in demanding his
fees; and the townspeople, his political views.
There was a story that one evening, at a public dinner, he had gotten up
and said, "I drink to the memory of the only physician of whose pure and
chaste renown I am envious,--the memory of my countryman, Dr. Guillotin
of Saintes!"
Had he really offered such a toast? The fact is, he pretended to be a
fierce radical, and was certainly the soul and the oracle of the small
socialistic clubs in the neighborhood. People looked aghast when he
began to talk of the reforms which he thought necessary; and they
trembled when he proclaimed his convictions, that "the sword and the
torch ought to search the rotten foundations of society.
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